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EAST ST. LOUIS • A paramedic had been charged in federal court here with 37 felonies after being accused of stealing the painkillers Fentanyl and morphine from Metro East ambulance inventories and hiding it with falsified records.
Jason Laut, a former paramedic, supervisor and dispatch manager with Medstar Ambulance Co. altered “numerous” reports and logs to falsely show that the drugs had been used, his indictment claims.
He logged drugs as having been used on trips that were never taken and for patients who never existed or whose condition precluded the use of the drugs, the indictment says. He falsely claimed authorization to use the drugs, including at least once naming a doctor who no longer worked for the hospital cited, the indictment says.
The defrendant was caught after officials suspected that someone was stealing drugs from Metro East area ambulances, officials said. An August 2014 inventory found eight intact vials of Fentanyl, and 55 that showed evidence of tampering, the indictment says.
Laut, 39, of O’Fallon, Ill., was indicted Jan. 18 on six counts of wire fraud, two counts of aggravated identity theft and 29 counts of making false statements. The indictment was sealed until his arrest.